Larry Jewell

Looks like we're recording as promised. We're talking with author Anne Perry. And Ann, you're visiting the United States. This is not unfamiliar territory for you, the United States? Oh, no, no. I lived here for about five years and loved it. What, first of all, what brought you to the United States initially and then what took you back? Well, it sounds a little bit crazy and I suppose it is. It was just a deep compulsion that I should be here that brought me here. It took me many years to get an immigrant's visa, but I wouldn't give up on it because I just felt that this is where I needed to be. And I went first of all to an area just outside San Francisco. And it was there that I met the church, which I suppose was really why I had to be here. Although I didn't know that I don't think I would ever have joined the church had I remained at home. I'm not sure that I would even have met with it. And certainly I wouldn't have felt the compulsion to investigate and to come to the conclusions that I did. And then after six months in that area, I went south to Los Angeles and I lived there for four and a half years, making five altogether. I enjoyed it very, very much. I went home because my father was very seriously ill and I felt my family needed me. And that really changed much of your life to make that. Oh, it changed my life completely, joining the church. And when I went home, I found that I could live for less expense, taking a part time job at first and continuing with writing. And then when my first book was published, I was fortunate enough to come into a little bit of money, enough to enable me to write full time, to get a very small 400 year old cottage out in the country, which meant I had no rent and minimum living expenses. Then I could write full time. Now the, the writing career really was not. When you were in the United States, was really still struggling? Very much struggling, yes. It was your 200th anniversary, 1976, when my first book was accepted and two years later when it actually came out in print. Now, before we went on the air, we were talking. You didn't really begin with mysteries. No, I started with historical dramas, which is what I really love and still I'm working at. But my father suggested to me, why don't you try a story about Jack the Ripper? Because he had his theories as to who he might have been. And I wasn't really interested in who Jack the Ripper was, but I was very interested in what happens to family relationships in a small community when there is a series of terrible crimes that are, at least for a while, unsolved. And it was that that got me started and I wrote a story about a series of crimes and what happened to family relationships under the pressure of investigation. And when that one sold, of course, I continued. And I find that I very much like the Victorian period because there is so much more value put upon reputation at that time. Therefore people will do more to cover the small things that would ruin a reputation which could be ruined very, very easily. I mean, a divorced woman was a non person, Therefore many women stayed with situations. They had quite different expectations of marriage. There was nothing else for a woman to do except either marry or remain at home as an unpaid servant companion to her mother, which could be pretty grim and very unrewarding because there was no work opportunity. She'd spend her time painting, embroidering, entertaining, polite tea parties, which is killing for a woman of any spirit and any intelligence. So my heroine did the unspeakable. She married a policeman, which is socially absolutely no, no, she'd never be received in polite circles again. But she investigates the above stairs side because her sister married above her. Her sister married a lord and she married social equal of the rat catcher. And so Emily gives her the entree to the withdrawing rooms of polite society and she investigates the society site and drags out the skeletons from the cupboards of the great families. And her husband investigates from the underworld side and the criminal underworld of the Victorian era is fascinating, appalling, dramatic truth, tragic, squalid. And I find sometimes the research I do is so grim that I. I can't bear it. One particular piece that I investigated was about baby farming, which is many women, of course, having no means of birth control, would find that they had more children than they could support and care for. And a servant girl who found herself pregnant, which could happen quite easily because parlour maids, for example, were chosen for their looks as footmen, were chosen for their height and matched as one might match horses. You, if you had real wealth, you'd have your matched footman. And your parlour maid usually was chosen for height and buxomness and pleasing face. And if the master of the house fancied her, what was she to do? Say no and find he threw her out, or say yes and find the mistress threw her out, or say yes and be discreet and then perhaps find she was pregnant. And so baby farmers would advertise in local periodicals and say, you know, good homely motherly woman will look after a child if the mother is unable to. Sickly children especially cared for so much per week. And then they would have this enormous number of children and sickly ones were preferred because they died and they killed them. And then they would keep on taking the money and the really healthy bonnie ones could be sold. This sounds like something that you would find nowadays. But this was not now. This was Victorian era. This was Victorian era. But I usually choose those social tragedies which I think are still relevant to today. But when I started reading some of this business about baby farming, when I got a bit further into it, I mean, I sat there with a book in my hands and the tears running down my face, face. Because some of the poverty and tragedy is just so. It's devastating. But I like to include social problems as a source of crime because I regard crime as tragedy, not as titillation. I mean, I like to have fun. I love the withdrawing room scenes when all the ladies are sitting around together making barbed remarks to each other. And a little bit of the glamour and the romance that has to be so discreet, but I think it's so much more exciting for that. Now, the view from the west, from America, of British society is a very strict class structure in Victorian period. It was very strict indeed. And the remnants are still there. And that must add to the interrelations, just that very stiff, strict class. Oh, I think it does very much. And it's one of the things that I find interesting because it imposes quite a rigid form of behavior upon people and therefore it distorts what they do. Sharp angles. Yes, exactly. And I think it's fun to write in that period. And it has a certain glamour to it. The long dresses and the great big hats and the formal calls, the hansom cabs, the gaslight. I think it's a fun period to write about. And because there are. There was little recourse to law for many people to solve their problems. Therefore there's an abundance of understandable motives. Not excusable, but understandable. And I think that the motive and its power is the chief source of a good mystery. Now, there seems to be a fascination with Victorian era beyond Great Britain. In the us There seems to be a fascination to read about it. Good. Do you find it in other parts of the world, too? I don't know. My chief interest is in the United States because that's where I'm published. And after all, we have very much in common in a language, in a culture and a heritage. And I've Lived here and been very happy living here. If other countries, the first three have been translated into Italian and I've heard that the Germans have bought one. But my main interest is in the United States. But of course, anywhere that will buy them. I'm only too happy. Now you, as we were talking, 10 years of struggle before you finally quote, unquote, hit it big. Well, hit it middle sized. Hit it midway. Yes, I'm not big yet. I'm working on that. That's not uncommon for. For authors to struggle and struggle and struggle before they get their first major published work. I thought at the time that I must be the only person who'd ever struggled that so hard, so long. But I understand it's about average. Someone once said that you can. You can be a carpenter, you can do it, whatever. But real work is writing. You sweat blood. Is that right? It is hard work, but it is immensely enjoyable. I work every day except Tuesdays, Sundays and Thursdays. Sundays I don't work because I don't work on the Lord's day. Thursdays I have a friend that I go and visit. She's disabled. I visit with her and do certain things that she. She can't do for herself. But every other day, I mean, I wake up Monday morning thinking, boy, right, it's Monday. I may work. Not. I have to. I may. I'm free to work, which is what I most want to do. Is it a compulsion? Yes, absolutely. I don't think about work on Sundays. But if I wake up in the night and it's before midnight, I won't think about it. But if it's after midnight, I'm free to think about it. Do you ever find yourself on Thursdays or Sundays, jotting down lines, ideas that the. This is what I'm going to work on later. Not on Sundays. On Thursdays. Yes. Oh, yes. I'm. I'm nearly always either writing or thinking about it or taking in impressions and ideas and storing in the back of my mind for future use. Do you recall when the compulsion first arose in your life? No. According to my mother, my imagination was always there. It began when I was very little. Tell me a story. And mother used to be absolutely exhausted at times, and she'd lie down for a little rest. She tells me I used to crawl up. This is sort of when I was about 2 or so. Crawl up beside her and open her eyelids with my finger and say, are you in there? Tell me another story. So the storytelling really is. That's inborn. Yes. I think it's Inborn. It must be a. You sound like the compulsion is not one that's driving you down, but kind of lifting up your life. You must thoroughly enjoy it. Oh, I love it. If I have to go without writing for very long, I'm not happy and I haven't written much whilst I've been here, but I've collected an enormous amount of impressions and ideas and made notes and I mean, the brain is going 19 to the dozen. Your first book, what was the title of that one? The Cater Street Hangman. Romantic. There's no such place as Cater Street, I believe. But. But Jack the Ripper's crimes were committed around Mitre Square and I just played around with Mitre until I got Cater and then just Cater street and then. The most successful of your books, have you been able to pinpoint which one has been the most successful thus far? No, I don't know. But I. I believe that they are improving as they go along. The one that comes out in August has been selected by Mystery Guild as one of its two main choices and that's the first time that's happened and my publisher feels it's the best. I don't know which is the most successful. I think Bluegate Fields is for one reason, another my favorite because I think it's the strongest story. Silence and Hanover Close, which is the next one, is perhaps a stronger story. If I'm not improving, then there's something wrong. But my publisher and my agent seem to feel I am improving as I go along. As you look at what your work, what you're producing with your work, as you look at it, where do you feel that you're improving as an author? You yourself. Oh, slightly tighter plots, better motivation, I hope. A slight sharpening and improvement of style. Yes. Tightening up the bits that I might have let be a little bit slack before. Just general tightening up. Improvement in not repeating myself. Slightly sharper detail. I think one of the best tools in writing is to be able to do a sharp cameo scene which says what you mean to say in character rather than explaining it. A little cameo picture where character shows where seen mo historical setting, cultural background shows. And I hope I'm getting better at doing that generated by the interaction as opposed to describing the interaction. Yes. I've got an extremely good agent who goes through in fine detail and will make several full scap sheet single spaced comments. And I learn a lot from her because I am prepared to write and rewrite and re rewrite until it is the best that I can do. She does not alter What I want to say, she helps me to say it with more skill and more power. And I'm very. She's a very good agent indeed. Do you find that you now have Anne Perry groupies? People that just read anything that's by Ann Perry? I believe so. Of course. You see, I live in England and I'm published in America, so I. But yes, in Denver, I. When I went into a bookshop, they told me that there are people who wish to be notified when the next one comes out. So I suppose that that answers the question. Has it happened in Great Britain? Has this sort of. No, I'm not published in Great Britain. Not at all? No, no. I mean, America's the place as far as I'm concerned. So you're anonymous in Great Britain? Absolutely. But, yes, I do find when I come here that it's beginning to get a group of people who will come. There's a bookshop in San Diego has invited me for a signing and they've asked me to go at two and remain until half past seven. So they must be expecting a lot of people and I do hope they're not disappointed. Be embarrassing. Do you anticipate that your books will be published in Great Britain eventually? Well, there is a British publisher who's asked for two or three, and they have looked at them and then asked to see the galleys of the next one coming out. Whether they'll accept them or not, I don't know. But Italy's taken three and Germany's taken one. Britain might. But as long as America continues taking them, that's good. And if I have to settle for that, I'll get by on it. You mentioned 10 years of struggle before the first one was really published and went well. Do you find interest among some of the readers now in going back and finding some of those early books? Yes, actually, the first five have been reissued. They all go to paperback about a year after the hardback, and the first five paperbacks have been reissued. So they're sort of the first issue in paperback and the second issue in paperback, so they are all available. Are you planning to take a different direction eventually with some of your writing, or is the mystery comfortable and. Oh, I want to continue with the series historical ones, and I have got a couple sitting with publishers and I mean, let's hope. I very much want. I care intensely about the serious historical ones. When I say serious, I mean they're not romances, they're dramas. I'm more interested in power and the search for truth. What people will do for power and with power, how it affects them and what people will do to learn the truth and how some people accept it and some reject it. There are a lot of things I want to write about, but since the mysteries sell and I do enjoy them, I can't foresee a time when I won't write a mystery every now and again. It sounds like you're divided in your enjoyment of developing the story and developing the characters. Which do you prefer most? The characters. And the story becomes the vehicle to develop the characters, or is the story more fascinating to you? I think what I'm trying to say about whatever it is is the. That fact first thing, and then the characters, and then the story grows from that. But I. When I write something, I know the end and then I work backwards to what beginning will produce that end. But on the serious historical ones. The one I'm working on at the moment is about a woman's search for truth. And it's an epic fantasy, I think is what you term it. But she's prepared to do to pay what it costs to learn the sublime truth. And it's. It's a quest story, really. And that is what concerns me above all. Her character. Yes, but her quest first. And what happens when she brings truth back and presents it to her people, how they accept it and reject it and what it does to them. Do you find there's a particular time of the week or of the day when your mind is most active in producing ideas? Yes, I'm a morning person, basically, and about 2 o' clock in the afternoon I could nicely take a siesta. Then I feel fine and ready to go again. Aha. So both ends of the day? Yes, yes. Right. About 2 o'. Clock. Forget it. But then if I take half an hour's nap, then it's like morning again and I'm ready to go off. I love to work out. I'm very much a compulsive worker. If you're a writer, you can create your own world and people and situations. You've got it all now. You're not living in London now? No, I live in a little cottage in a hamlet called Darshan, which is about 90 miles north and east of London. My College is about 400 years old and there are 302 people, I think, on the electoral register. So it's a tiny little place and quite a ways away from London. Now, 90 miles, it's about two and a quarter hours train journey because the train stops everywhere. I mean, if it didn't stop Everywhere. It wouldn't stop. Now back to the U.S. now, this is your first trip to the U.S. in how many years now? About five years. And it was about 10 years between that and leaving. After I lived here, I would come here every year if I could afford to. And I love it. And the people have been. Do you know, I arrived here on March 17th. I've been in New York, in Denver, in Provo, in Salt Lake, and now in St. George. And I have met taxi drivers, people in shops, airport officials, loads and loads of people of all sorts. And I have not yet met one discourteous person. That's amazing. But that includes the New York taxi drivers. Not one discourteous person. And I think you should be proud of that. Yes, I think I should be amazed. Well, it's the truth. It's the truth. You really enjoy this country? I really do, and I enjoy the people. Now, While you're in St. George, what are some of the activities that you'll be participating in? Well, I only arrived on Monday evening and we had a family home evening. And I'm staying with my very good friends Phil and Evelyn Fonz, who have made it possible for me to be here. We had a family home evening on Monday. Yesterday we did a little bit of sightseeing. I went to the tabernacle where I was very impressed. Heard some wonderful, really spiritual recounts of history. And then in the evening we had a very fine reception where I met some interesting people. It was at the home of the president of Dixie College, and there were such interesting, stimulating people there, and we talked for hours. And then today I'm doing this, and tomorrow I think we're doing a little more sightseeing. And then on Friday, Phil and Evelyn are driving me to Las Vegas, where I'm getting a plane for Los Angeles because I've got a signing on Saturday. Do you have any signings in this area? No, we didn't have enough advance notice that I was going to be able to come. Ah. So it's just. This is more the vacation portion of it for you. It's all been fun, but I. I do mean to drop in at the RNK bookshop, where I believe they stock my books. Great. I'd like to drop in and just see them. Super. When will your next book be out, do you anticipate. August. August. Anne Perry, thank you for being with us and may have a pleasant journey the rest of the way through the US if it's as good as what's been, it'll be marvelous. Thank you. Author Anne Perry. Thank you.